The president of Taiwan, Tsai Ing-wen, has left her position this Saturday at the head of the Government party, the Progressive Democrats (PDP), after suffering a resounding defeat in local elections. The gesture, which complies with a political tradition of the self-governing island, involves assuming responsibility for poor results. The formation of her chinosceptic and inclined towards independence, it has lost the mayoralties of the main cities to the nationalist Kuomintang (KMT), closer to building ties with Beijing, which considers the territory an inalienable part of its territory. In the capital, Taipei, Chiang Wan-an, the supposed great-grandson of Chiang Kai-shek, the historic leader of the KMT, has taken over the mayor’s office.
“The results have been below our expectations,” Tsai said in an appearance. “We humbly accept the results and accept the decision of the Taiwanese people.” In 2018, when she was already the president of Taiwan, she also left office at the head of the PDP after a debacle in the municipal elections. “I must assume full responsibility”, she has acknowledged at the headquarters of her party. “With results like these, there are many areas that we need to look at.” Her 66-year-old policy plans to continue leading the country until the end of her term, in 2024.
The electoral contest has been to a certain extent a respite from the geopolitical debate that has dominated the scene in recent months, and has been focused on domestic and daily issues, such as pollution, traffic jams, crime and the acquisition of vaccines against the covid. But Tsai herself called for taking the vote as more than just a local ballot, assuring the world has its sights set on Taiwan and its defense of democracy in the face of military tensions with China.
Relations on both sides of the Strait entered a turbulent phase in August. The controversial visit to the island by the speaker of the US House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, enraged Beijing, which considered that Washington had crossed a red line, and the Asian giant made its anger clear by carrying out some powerful military exercises in around the self-governing territory. The incident has marked the international agenda in recent months, further chilling the icy diplomacy between China and the United States. The leaders of both powers, Xi Jinping and Joe Biden, have managed to redress part of their differences at the recent G-20 summit in Bali.
Beijing has been quick to stress that the results “have revealed that the island’s majority public opinion is in favor of peace, stability and good life,” according to a spokesman for the Taiwan Affairs Office quoted by the official agency. Xinhua.
The Taiwanese elections can be interpreted as a mid-term defeat for Tsai, who has served as president since 2016 and revalidated her position in the 2020 elections. Although her results should not be exaggerated either: her last presidential victory also carried the echo of failure in the previous municipalities.
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This time, the Taiwanese elected mayors and councilors in 9 cities and 13 counties. With most of the votes counted, the KMT led or had already been proclaimed the winner this Saturday in 13 of them and the PDP only in five, with results very similar to those of 2018. A proposal was also voted in a referendum to lower the voting age from 20 to 18, an initiative that has not gone ahead.
In Taipei, Chiang Wan-an, who claims himself to be Chiang Kai-shek’s great-grandson, has proclaimed himself the winner. According to The Strait Times, He considers himself the grandson of an extramarital affair of the son of the historic KMT leader who fought in the Chinese civil war against Mao Zedong’s communists and, after his defeat, ended up taking refuge in Taiwan, where he established his own government, which he called the Republic of China.
The new rising star of the nationalist party has become, at 43, the youngest mayor of Taipei, a position that could serve as a platform for the presidency. “All of us have achieved it,” Chiang proclaimed this Saturday before several thousand people gathered in front of his party headquarters. “I will let the world see the greatness of Taipei,” he added in a speech in which he made no reference to the tense geopolitical issue that hovers over the enclave. The defeated candidate in the capital, Chen Shih-chung of the ruling PDP, also largely avoided delving into the muddy geopolitical terrain.
The island’s ties with China were at their best in more than 70 years of history during the tenure of the last Kuomintang chairman, Ma Ying-jeou, from 2008 to 2016. The winds of change began to blow with Tsai’s arrival in The presidency. “Only respect for the Taiwanese people’s commitment to our sovereignty, democracy and freedom can serve as the basis for resuming constructive interaction across the Taiwan Strait,” he claimed in October in a speech delivered on the occasion of the Republic of China National Day. in which he considered “regrettable” that Beijing has intensified “intimidation”, threatening “peace and stability” in the region.
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